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Collabo Innovations, Inc. v. Sony Corporation, et al.

Paid petition · United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, No. 2018-1311 · judgment August 5, 2019

Certiorari denied · June 22, 2020
Pre-decision estimate: 3% cert probability

Before the decision, well below the 4.1% base rate, with no standout signals pointing toward a grant.

Questions presented

When U.S. Patent No. 5,952,714 issued in September 1999, the Patent Act provided only two avenues for challenging the validity of the patent’s claims: ex parte reexamination and district court litigation. Shortly thereafter, Congress added a third method, inter partes reexamination, but deliberately chose to exclude older patents from the new proceeding. More than 10 years later, Congress replaced inter partes reexamination with a fundamentally different proceeding, inter partes review, and made it apply retroactively to all prior patents. The questions presented are as follows:

  1. Does the retroactive application of inter partes review to a patent that issued before the passage of the Leahy–Smith America Invents Act, Pub. L. No. 11-29, 125 Stat. 284 (2011), violate the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment?

  2. Does the retroactive application of inter partes review to a patent that issued before the passage of the Leahy–Smith America Invents Act, Pub. L. No. 11-29, 125 Stat. 284 (2011), violate the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment?

Counsel of record

For petitioner
Patrick J. Conroy
Bragalone Conroy PC

For respondent
Andrew S. Baluch
Smith Baluch LLP

Case

Conference history
Distributed for 4 conferences

Proceedings

  1. Jun 22 2020
    Petition DENIED.
  2. Jun 15 2020
    DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 6/18/2020.
  3. Jun 09 2020
    Rescheduled.
  4. Jun 08 2020
    DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 6/11/2020.
  5. Jun 02 2020
    Rescheduled.
  6. May 19 2020
    DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 6/4/2020.
  7. Mar 12 2020
    Rescheduled.
  8. Feb 26 2020
    DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 3/20/2020.
  9. Feb 24 2020
    Reply of petitioner Collabo Innovations Inc filed.
  10. Feb 07 2020
    Brief of respondent Sony Corporation in opposition filed.
  11. Feb 07 2020
    Brief of federal respondent in opposition filed.
  12. Dec 20 2019
    Motion to extend the time to file a response is granted and the time is further extended to and including February 7, 2020, for all respondents.
  13. Dec 17 2019
    Motion of respondent Sony Corporation to extend the time to file a response from January 8, 2020 to February 7, 2020, submitted to The Clerk.
  14. Dec 05 2019
    Motion to extend the time to file a response is granted and the time is extended to and including January 8, 2020, for all respondents.
  15. Dec 04 2019
    Motion of the Solicitor General to extend the time to file a response from December 9, 2019 to January 8, 2020, submitted to The Clerk.
  16. Nov 04 2019
    Petition for a writ of certiorari filed. (Response due December 9, 2019)